What is a Smart Bathroom?

The term smart bathing might sound strange to some. But this is actually an improved technology that has a lot of benefits. It is in light of this that we have decided to make this guide on what smart bathing is. If you are curious to know what it is, then you need to read through this guide keenly.

What is a Smart Bathroom?

An emerging technology in home comfort systems called “smart bathrooms” allows homeowners to control and monitor all aspects of their home’s bathrooms. Let’s look at some of the basics regarding smart bathrooms, what good they can do for our comfort and our wallet, and take a closer look at a few popular choices.

Just about every product we buy these days is touted as having some attribute that makes it “smarter” than the competing product. We can buy water that is smart. TVs are smart now, as are phones, tablets; and devices like Amazon’s Alexa, or the Google Nest that take over control of entire homes, from turning on lights, to shutting off the water mains.

Like any other technology the “smart” label gets affixed to, smart bathrooms use digital means to control the temperature, and flow rate, start and stop water flow, and even determine how long the bathroom lasts. I’m not sure how I feel about a computer telling me I’ve been in the bathroom for too long, but that’s a topic for a different blog.

Smart bathrooms can refer to a variety of fixtures and appliances that from their most simplistic consist of a single, water-powered, LED lighted, and digital bathroom head.

How do smart bathrooms work?

Smart bathroom solutions are typically a part of a full suite of smart building products. When done properly, this means those property managers, employees, and staff who need access to relevant information can find data on every running system in the building on a common digital interface.

You need your facilities in pristine condition at every moment that your business is open. This means that your maintenance team needs access to user information in real time.

While this may sound like an impossible feat, the technology for all of this and more already exists. With a bit of creativity, you can set up almost any automation you can think of to work together and make your restrooms a pleasure to visit.

Now, let’s take a look at a few upgrades that we suggest. These are sure to help you save money on maintenance while giving your guests a higher-quality experience.

Smart-bathroom benefits

Some of the benefits of a smart home include convenience and energy savings. These are also smart-bathroom benefits. Yet the list of reasons to upgrade to a smart bathroom doesn’t stop there.

Set a precise and consistent water temperature.

Digital temperature controls of the thermostatic valve give you the ability to select an exact water temperature. The sensors in the system ensure that the temp stays exactly at that setting throughout your bathroom.

Control and manage your bathroom remotely.

With a fully connected smart bathroom system, you can turn on your bathroom from your phone or smart speaker as you’re getting out of bed or when you’re returning from a workout. That way, it’s ready for you to just step in.

Activate your bathroom through voice control.

Your smart speaker can give you effortless and hands-free control of your bathroom. Through voice alone, you can turn the water on and off and set its temperature.

Automate your bathroom routine.

Add bathroom programming to your routines for smart-home assistants. With home automation bathroom control, you can program your bathroom according to your schedule. For instance, you can have your bathroom ready when you wake in the morning. Or, you can program the bathrooms to run at a certain temperature for a certain length of time.

Avoid scalding with built-in safety features.

It is surprisingly easy to burn yourself or a family member with water that’s too hot. An important smart-bathroom benefit is enhanced safety that comes through limits on the highest water temperature.

Reduce your home’s water consumption.

You can reduce your average bathroom water usage and cut the energy used to heat water. Program optimal settings for the length of your bathroom, rate of flow, and water temperature. You’ll enjoy comfortable bathrooms without waste.

Enjoy a sleeker, more modern design.

You can increase your property value with smart-home upgrades like a smart bathroom. Bathrooms are one of the major influences on buyers. A modern-looking bathroom can pay for itself with an increased sales price.

And if you aren’t selling, having a nice bathroom is something you can enjoy every day all by yourself.

Smart Bathroom Technology You Need To Know About

Bathroom Speakers

Bathroom speakers used to be fairly limited by the need for waterproofing and battery power. With advances in lithium battery technology, it has become possible to create bathroom speakers that will play for hours at a time and recharge incredibly quickly. The advances in bathroom speaker tech have coincided with improvements in phone technology and apps that play media. Pick a song, listen to an audiobook, or follow a podcast all from the comfort of the bathtub.

The one issue all bathroom and bathroom speakers face is acoustic. The hard, shiny surfaces in the bathroom are great for keeping clean and preventing dampness but they reflect sound very efficiently which is great for singing in the bathroom but not so good for playing music with a speaker. Newer (and more expensive) bathroom and bathroom speakers are designed to be optimized for use in the bathroom and work to negate some of the acoustic issues.

If you like to take long baths and really pamper yourself in the bathroom then playing relaxing songs over a phone simply will not do. It’s time to upgrade to a high-quality, waterproof, Bluetooth bathroom speaker.

Smart Bathroom Heads

One of the real advancements in bathroom technology has been the smart bathroom head. As long as there have been bathrooms there have been decorative bathroom heads then the world became obsessed with power bathrooms and high water pressure before returning to a wide, rainfall type of bathroom. Alongside the changing tastes in bathroom head types, there have been some developments in just what a bathroom head can do.

Firstly it’s important to distinguish between two broad categories of smart bathroom heads; practical and entertainment. A practical smart bathroom head can do things like monitor water usage to reduce the water bill or even cut out entirely when there’s nobody under the bathroom. An entertainment smart bathroom head is more focused on delivering a better overall experience with lights, speakers, and even a digital assistant.

Touchless faucet

Much like automatic toilets, touchless faucets have become almost commonplace in recent years. Here, again, usage data can be collected and used to maintain optimal cleanliness. If someone doesn’t need to touch a faucet, there is a lower chance that they might drip water on the sink counter.

Smart lighting

With LEDs and other energy-saving lighting becoming more popular, energy consumption is constantly dropping. Still, no light saves as much energy as one turned off, and you can program lights in your smart bathroom to dim or turn off completely when not in use.

Just be sure to include sensors in places where you expect people to be — no one wants to be suddenly plunged into darkness in the middle of using your restroom!

Scent

While this may be a somewhat sensitive topic, the truth is that commercial bathrooms can be the source of more than their fair share of offensive smells. Many restrooms already employ air fresheners that dispense blasts of scent on a timer, but what if you could make it even smarter?

Automation allows you to synchronize air freshening and even filtration with a toilet flush or the use of toilet paper.

Heating/HVAC

You want your guests to be comfortable when they use your restroom, so it makes sense to include a smart heating and HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, Air Conditioning) solution.

While it can be difficult to shift the temperature in a large open space such as a retail store, restrooms can be controlled to maintain comfortable temperatures regardless of the weather outside or the climate in the rest of your space.

Smart Toilet

It may be one of the least talked about household appliances but the humble toilet has long been the focus of bathroom innovation. The much fabled Japanese Style Toilet has been a subject of curiosity for anyone that has ever heard of, let alone used one.

For a long time, these were the only examples of what any sane person would consider being toilet technology. For most people, the biggest advancements in toilet tech in recent years have been soft closing seats and high or low-volume flushes but there is so much more available. Heated seats, night lights, front and back “cleansing” jets, air dryers extractor fans, and deodorizers are all available at a price.

Speaking of price, if a whole new installation and the costs associated with it are less attractive than the benefits of a fully smart toilet there are cheaper options. Retrofitting a smart toilet seat may not provide the same level of functionality but it will give a similar result at a fraction of the cost.

Bathroom TV

There has never been as much digital content to consume and connectivity has never been better but for many people, the bathroom remains the last bastion of peace and quiet. Not everyone shares the same need for a quiet space and for those people the bathroom TV could be the ideal solution.

The idea of fitting a television in the bathroom is not a new one but as with all digital technology the options increase, the functionality improves and the price reduces over time. Since the first time television in the bathroom was featured in the Soakology blog, there have been huge improvements and everything from fitting options to picture quality is now far better.

Conclusion

In conclusion, smart bathroom technology offers numerous benefits to its users. You should consider implementing this technology in your house